Heirlooms
by phantomwriter05
Summary: Concept Fic: Decades after the Battle of Exegol Ben Solo and Rey reunite and meet one half of a pair of twins that the other has raised. Rey as a Governess of a secret daughter raised as a elegant and beautiful Princess in a shining castle. Ben as the father and Jedi Master of a brooding War Hero. Each child a reflection of the past in a future of the last of dueling bloodlines.
1. Chapter 1

The stream ran quietly on the bright summer evening. The ragged robes of grey and black stood in contrast on the golden hue of the green trees and tall wheat fields that lead down to the clear creek which flowed with the serene whisper of peace and nature. Ben Solo, now worn and hardened by many years of wandering and regret felt ashamed of being in such a place. He felt a dark cloud, an ill sign in all of this majesty and beauty. What a golden childhood this place must have provided for such an innocent child who had been raised ever so gently with love and light within the watchful guard of a mother in disguise.

The man paused in the cloud of summer pollen from golden stalks that brushed against his threadbare Outlander cloak. His walking stick anchored in the soft sod. He was attacked with sudden doubt, guilt, and regret. He wasn't sure what she'd think of him, what Rey had told her of this gruesome, selfish villain that would not give up his power till he was forced too. A man who sought a boy, took an apprentice that was not her, though he was equally her father as he was the boy's.

Ben Solo saw himself as he deemed himself should be judged at the enchanted forest edge. And his heart faltered in the many dark deeds that he had done, not only to the galaxy, but to the very family he had not asked for but had wanted with all his heart from the moment he took Rey in his arms near the ruins of an ancient Dark Lord's temple many long years ago.

He meant to go but was halted when a figure waltzed out of the eves of the low hanging branches on the forest's edge. She had a regal waltz on her lips that she hummed from a pale throat. Her raiment was a royal blue dress, country spun, despite the royal fostering of the planet's King and Queen that her mother entrusted their lives too. But the dress, the swift footsteps, and the light that exuded from her being was truth enough of the kind of young woman she was. A girl that had grown up gently and loved in a palace of peace, under the tutelage of a Governess whose real identity was kept from her.

All the hard years and regret seemed to melt on Ben Solo's bearded face looking upon the greatest treasures in the whole galaxy. For her long tresses were raven and curled, shimmering a blue hue when the sparkles of twilight was caught in their net. Her pale face was shown with the dauntless light of the spring of youth. The dark, the light, the balance that created her only increased, made stronger, the perfection of her immaculate beauty inside and out.

The girl held to a brown leather-bound book to her chest as she walked barefoot out to the clearing of the field. Her Mama would kill her if she saw the dirty feet, the ring of creek bed mud around the bottom of her skirts. But how could the Queen ever expect her princess to not set her feet into something so cool and clean. Rey would understand. Her Governess, the Jedi mistress, always knew her mind better than anyone since she was but a girl on her knee, learning of many things with a smile and a cuddle.

But she paused when she saw a dark figure standing in the field. The waltz in her throat paused, her twirling finger caught in her raven curl. He looked weary and worn by many cares, half a life consumed with anger and the other bitterly regretful of the life wasted on such minor wrongs. The sea stains of Ach-Too left him utterly without color, the salt staining his Outlander clothing. Under her gaze he seemed to cower, to shrink away.

Yet, while others might look upon this wraith with fear and mistrust, the girl only felt compassion and a great love, fore she perceived long had he repented whatever evil had been in his heart and much suffering had he borne for it, more than any prejudice could she bear in her golden heart for this stranger. And, in the end, it was not by great deed or noble end had Ben Solo been redeemed. But by the simple love of a bright smile by his daughter to a stranger that she took into her heart upon sight of him.

It was only then that Ben Solo knew that he had done at least one thing right in his life.

* * *

**Author's Notes **

_This is just a Concept Fanfic told in two parts one with Ben and the next with Rey. _

_If there's interest than it might turn it into a full fledged story ... just putting this out here to see what everyone thinks._

_Next chapter will deal with Rey and her meeting with Ben and her son for the first time._


	2. The Crusader

It had been twenty-two years and the first thing she did when she saw Ben was kiss him. She kissed him as if they were still young, star-crossed lovers out to destroy the galaxy and save it all over again. She knew she had to stay away, that they had both agreed not to do it again. But she had never felt more complete, more whole than when he was in her arms, when he was inside of her. She wished to God it wasn't so … but it was. They were made for one another, created in the schemes of a chaotic universe to be one another's other half, a balance. A Force Dyad. And the further they were apart, the longer, the more the pull became stronger when they were close. She didn't even try to resist it when she saw him standing in the sitting room of her modest country estate, rugged, worn with years of exile and regret. He said her name … it was all that was said. But just the sound of his voice reverberating in the gilded room shot her to cross the threshold and into his arms with a desperate sob in her leap of passion.

She kissed him … and continued to kiss him. Rey was fuel to a fire that consumed them both till there was no other choice but to have her, to have him, to have each other. Even now her legs shook from the afternoon of 'reunion', but she felt so whole now, so elated in contemplation that she didn't think of what to do next. The woman was only content that in the morning she'd wake up to feel completely consumed in his large embrace, to turn over and watch him sleep, knowing that he was safe, that he was with her.

Complete with the knowledge that they were where they belonged.

But Rey was always going to be Rey, which Finn loved, and Poe lamented. For a happy Rey was an idealistic Rey. She was a Rey that used her golden heart and not her empty head. Ben told her that 'he' was here. One of their beloved creations had brought the Falcon, being chased by Bounty Hunters, and enduring several adventures to get here, to bring Ben to her and their daughter. But when he saw Rey's eyes come alight with emotion and love at the thought of both their children being here, so close to her, Ben cautioned her not to go to him. He warned her not to approach _their son_ without himself present. Jacen Solo, Captain of the Millennium Falcon, wasn't an easy rogue to get along with …

and dark had been his mood and mind of late.

They were called _"Crusaders"_.

Founded on Ach-To, they were thirty Jedi Knights and Apprentices that banded together to protect the Ancient Holy Sites from the Sith Acolytes and their mercenaries. The members of the Emperor's cultist coven who escaped Exegol saw their power and influence increase over the years, building many evil temples and preaching the gospels of the Dark Lords across the galaxy. But soon the Jedi Crusaders, formed to stamp out the cancer of Palpatine from the galaxy forever, were drawn into the war between Republic and the warrior conclaves of the unified Mandalorian Tribes. If it was one thing that Rey knew it was that history repeated itself constantly, and those who forgot it, found one self in the same position. The Jedi Crusaders followed Jacen Solo, much like his father who had formed the Knights of Ren. They turned the tide of the war, though at a great cost to themselves and the Galaxy.

The war had ended with great horror, for the Mandalorian warrior culture forbid surrender. They had fought to the very last 'Foundling'. It was a type of terrible warfare that Rebels and Imperials never knew, and Resistance and First Order never dared to fight. And when it was over The Crusaders, what was left of them, were exiled. Jacen's heroism in battle was marred by his cutting down of women and children who fought to the last blaster bolt, the last gasp, and the last full measure of senselessness.

It had been an unpopular war with the Galactic public, A war between The Jedi and another ideological foe, and when the end came at horrific costs both in life and morality; the politicians looked for scape goats for an outraged public. And they found them with The Jedi Crusaders when it was further revealed that Jacen Solo was in fact the son of Ben Solo, the once dreaded Dark Lord, Kylo Ren, Supreme Leader of the First Order. But worst of all, his mother was Princess Rey Palpatine, heiress to the Sith Empire. Who even now, though a mage of pure light and virtue, was worshiped as a deity by cultists with human sacrifices and other monstrous rituals in their foul and evil jagged temples of black polished stone. It was hard to understand how someone who had formed a brotherhood of Knights to end the dark side's sway and protect the Galaxy from the war-like armored covens of Madalore would turn out to be his mightiest foe's only great-grandson. He went from the greatest hero of the Republic to the most hated man in the entire Galaxy, with the help of the New Republic Senate and Media. He was blamed for the war. And was cruelly labeled "child killer" by anti-war activists that 'resisted' against the 'Galactic War Machine', these entitled sons and daughters of the Galactic elite finding validation in their activism, now knowing the once hero's maternity.

So it was that Ben warned the mother of his children that it would not be suggested for Rey to race up to "The Blue Comet", especially when he wasn't too keen on his Palpatine mother, whose Beautiful and dark visage he had seen glorified on too many frescos on evil temple walls. But here Rey was, walking by moonlight to a little tavern that was certainly not a place she had experienced in a long time. For over twenty years, Rey had been the Governess of a Royal house, watching over and educating a secret daughter. She was now long party to masquerade balls, fancy dinners, and the highest of high class in galactic society that her daughter, the princess, lived in with great ease and comfort. But out in the woods, far from the Palace, estate, and village, was the worst kind of scum and villainy that took her back to her childhood and rebel days.

She wore a long silken blue cloak of white trim and silver stars. She immediately knew that she had made a mistake when she entered the rough joint wearing it. But, then, she never once thought about it. Jaina had made it for her, and as her mother, she wore it everywhere as a sign of love for a daughter who did not yet know her true identity. But more so, while Ben slept, she had spent considerable time with C-3PO making herself as lovely as she liked. It was, after all, the first time she was going to see her son since he was a baby. She wasn't sure why, but she just wanted him to see her how she knew she had wanted to see her own mother, in her mind, long after they left her with Unkar.

Threepio was very proud of the regal look of fairy tales they had made for her with long glossy ringlets and ruby lips. But now that she was in the tavern, filled to the rafters with green and blue hookah smoke and the raspy, gasping, and growling laughter of unsavory characters of a dozen races, she knew the whole makeover was stupid in a hive of slime like this.

She went from patron to patron at the bar and addressed the occupants at shadowy tables, asking for Captain Jacen Solo. They all growled in contempt, of either the beautiful lady of the royal court, or of the young Captain they had a grudge against. Then, there were those that faked knowledge that they were willing to share, if she'd come sit on their lap. Finally, when she had asked a Protocol Droid with an insect like metallic head and long blaster rifle, a young woman came up to her and angrily grasped her by the elbow. She led her away from the droid who immediately left to go talk to a Trandoshan in a yellow flight suit. They both turned to look at Rey, the lizard man growling in predatory interest at what the droid was saying.

Once they were away, the young woman slung Rey into a corner booth. Immediately, she recognized the petite woman from General Leia's old Alliance files. Her name was Jyn Erso, she was a member of a Rebel extremist group, before she reformed and became a vaulted hero among the Alliance. But Rey didn't understand it. Jyn Erso died in battle at an Imperial archive complex sixty years ago. But, then, she noticed the girl's face, her skin. She had no body hair on her except for her eyebrows and the long glossy chocolate locks on her head. Her beautiful face was pristine, unblemished. Her sad and distant green eyes were the only thing weathered about her. If that wasn't enough, she had on a leather waist coat that bore a Specialist Commando patch on her shoulder. She wore military grade, skintight, all terrain, leather combat pants and shiny knee-high double grip boots …

She was a special Republic combat clone.

"I thought you went up to get a drink … not a Fairy Princess."

"Yeah, well, while I was there, this one was trying to give her order to 4-LOM for your head."

Rey quickly turned to the figure leaning back against the leather upholstery who Jyn's Core accent was addressing. The woman knew him from the moment she had lay eyes on him. Rey still remembered how he felt against her breast when Chewie placed him in her arms only moments after he was born. He had the woman's eyes and her face. But he had Ben's height and grown out curls in Rey's own coloring. Yet, it was his swagger and roguish ease that was more than just a passing likeness of his Grandfather Han Solo. It was only enhanced by the way he slouched, his X-Wing pilot boots up on the table, cynically looking the Royal Courtier over in disinterest.

He wore black trousers with red "Corellian Blood Stripes" down the outer seams, a dark blue Henley, and a brown leather peacoat, collar done up in the back, with the "Rogue Squadron" insignia on his arm. Around his neck was a unique pendant. Though outlawed and reviled, the young rogue Jedi still wore his Crusader pendent defiantly. It was Padme Skywalker's Japor Snippit necklace that had a sliver of a Black Kyber Crystal dangled at the bottom. Taken from the famed "Darksaber" of Madalore, Jacen had kept it as a trophy. Though Din Djarin did not fall to the Cystal blade of the Skywalker Legacy Lightsaber without leaving a memento of he and Solo's duel. Like his Great-Grandfather and his father before him, Jacen bore a thin lightsaber scar across his right eye that marred the otherwise handsome features of the young Jedi Crusader. Altogether, the youth, scar and swagger, never cut a more dashingly rebellious figure that was fitting for a Captain of the Millennium Falcon and one of the last Skywalkers.

"Jacen …" She couldn't stop the emotional quake in her polished accented voice. She swallowed, calming herself. "You're Jacen Solo?" She asked with a nod, seriousness in her glassy eyes.

For a long moment he watched the woman, before turning to his First Mate and partner Jyn with a look of suspicion. Finally, he relented with interest that superseded his caution. His voice was youthful but now hard bitten by sights and sounds from the horrors of war unimaginable. Yet, for the facetiousness of his comment, there was something sorrowful in his voice.

"I used to be …"

Her eyes lightened at the familiar line spoken once to an enthusiastic young girl by a legendary smuggler. Then, there was a sort of romance about the dashingly brooding figure of Han Solo. Now that it was her child wearing the cynicism, it only made her devastated.

She had thought about Jaina, her beautiful and kind little girl. Rey had not given her up but, all the same, had disassociated herself from the girl's destiny. She had given up her rights as a mother, to be a better guardian, to protect her from her mother's past, to never lay the burdens and sins of a name upon such an innocent baby girl. So, she left the girl's care to an army of nurses and left to train Finn in the ways of the Force. And when the girl was of age, she returned to the little Princess as bodyguard and Governess. And from that time, she saw the joy, the kindness, and the wholesome years of a golden childhood bless her beautiful Jaina. She remembered sitting under a blossoming fruit tree atop a hill, a secret mother cherishing her daughter, eating the fresh snacks as the little princess sat in her lap while she cuddled BB-8 in her little pale arms. She giggled as she munched, Rey, brushing her luxurious black curls, BB-8 chirping up a storm in the princess's lap. Never had so much love overwhelmed the orphaned scavenger of Jakku's heart than in those precious little moments. Knowing the magic, the simple purity, that came from Ben and her love in this luminous soul that was big enough to consume a planet.

Sure, no life was without its troubles. The Queen was beautiful and elegant, but vapid and self-centered, and Jaina was ever desperate to impress her "mamma". The king was a kind man, warm, and loved his adopted daughter. But he was stern, strict, and over-protective. He had also been deeply and emphatically in love with Rey since he was but a prince, far from home, devoted to the cause of the Resistance against the First Order. And the woman would lie if she said, to her ever-lasting shame, that she had taken comfort in his arms at weak points in her life, so cut-off from Ben for so long. A part of her knew that the queen's sharp and abrasive behavior toward Jaina came from the knowledge that her husband was in love with Rey, that they were having a courtly affair, and the possibility that her "Daughter" might be her husband's after all. Yet, for all of Rey's mistakes over the years one thing remained constant. Her little girl, her Jaina, never had to contemplate the horror of her lineage, never was abandoned, never went home hungry or had to defend what was hers. She spent her life riding on Finn's shoulders, being given presents from far away by Poe, and BB-8 trailing behind her wherever she went. She was kind, sweet, generous, and safe due to a golden childhood of peace.

It was everything that Ben Solo could not give their son.

Rey wasn't expecting a brooding, cynical, hard edged youth who had seen suffering and death too early in his life. Under Ben's care, rootless, raised on the Millennium Falcon, with R2-D2 and C-3PO as nurse maids, Jacen could not escape the Skywalker Legacy. Hunted by Sith Acolytes, who torn their family asunder, who he was told had killed his mother, Ben raised their son to be a warrior. Forever on guard, forever memorizing exits in every room he entered, and ever at war with the cultist remnants of an Empire his father build. Jacen Solo spent his childhood on many dangerous adventures mopping up the Sith stranglehold on the galaxy and fighting Bounty Hunters after the price upon the head of the traitorous Ben Solo who turned his cloak on the cusp of victory for the love of their fallen Princess.

It was a childhood fraught with peril, fear, and combat. The boy was a master with a lightsaber, one of the greatest swordsmen in the Galaxy … because, he had to be. His most vivid childhood memory was sitting by the bed side of a grievously injured Ben Solo in the Captain's Quarters of the Falcon. A rasping voice of his father, his Jedi Master, telling him not to be afraid. Yet, a ten-year-old boy, having struck down his first man to defend a wounded father during a lightsaber duel with "The Necromancer", couldn't help it. If his father died, where would he go? What would he do? He had nowhere else to go and no one else to turn too. Somewhere his twin sister giggled, her hair being brushed with a golden comb by a worshipful mother, in the distance a shiny castle gleamed where they lived in peace. Millions of light-years away, C-3PO was doing what he could to save 'Master Ben's' life. Meanwhile, R2-D2 desperately attempted to fix the Hyper-Drive before the Sith Cult's Mercenaries detected the Millennium Falcon hiding inside the ice rings of a Gas-Giant where a Ten-Year-Old Prodigal and a near century old Astro-Mech piloted them too.

Jacen Solo was fire hardened in a childhood of harsh environments and the great burden of legacy that he could never escape as one of the last Skywalkers. Born as a child of "The Dyad", The boy's powers were considerable. And as he grew, shown the ways of the Force by his father, fostered and taught by many sages, monks, and Jesuits across the galaxy, his legend as "The Sith Hammer" only spread. His reputation as a warrior, the partner of the mighty Ben Solo, only antagonized the young Mandalorian foundlings who heard war drums. The Jedi, as the wandering Ronin, reemerging from myth and legend to defend Justice wherever it was threatened in a Galaxy afire with religious zealotry and a weakened centralized government only fanned ancient rivalries and tensions.

But still, it was Ben, his master, his father, who had told him and the other Jedi Knights in the aftermath of the "Glorious Defense of Ach-To" that only tragedy waited for them if they chose the battlefields of the Mandalorian Wars. But the boy had too much of his mother in him. Jacen, leading the Crusaders, raced head long into a brutal and savage conflict of the like unseen in the history of the Galaxy … burying his friends along the way. Now he was here, all innocence lost, sitting in the shadows of a wretched hive of scum and villainy, counting regrets and the many friends he had lost.

Now, tears welled in Rey's eyes as she looked over the young rogue Jedi Knight. There were so many things she had wanted to say to him. But words stuck in her throat, and she was afraid to say anything that wouldn't come out in a sob. So the woman instead reached out with her feelings. Like a soft maternal hand, she reached for him through the Force. At once, to give physicality to her need, she shed her starry silken cowl and let her long locks flow out, her beautiful face shining in the neon half-light of the tavern. Her eyes locked to his as the youth suddenly shot up alertly, removing his feet from atop the table, upon the reveal of a face seen many times in dreams and painted on temple walls.

She felt him reach out and touch her through their connection of the mind. Stroking, caressing, studying her like a child would. Such raw power of many things of past, present, and future swirled at their sudden bond. She was drawn to him immediately, like a magnet to metal. Her powers, her luminous light, welled deep inside of him, this creation that was part of her. It was the most powerful thing she ever felt in her life, not even the night in the hut with Ben on Ach-To was like this. It was one thing to find a soul mate. It was something even more powerful to feel the draw of your own child whom you love without question or thought.

Slowly, she lifted her hand and reached out to him physically. Her eyes were in tears, her breath shaky, and hand quaking. The bond between child and parent within the force was overwhelming, especially when it had been so long since they had touched, felt one another's presence. She felt his heart, his soul, all of it wanting this, desiring to feel the deep love and care of a mother he never knew, who wanted him so much.

But she let out a sputtered sob of protest involuntarily when she felt the conflict suddenly overtake him.

She was arrested by such vivid images which flashed in her mind. Piles and mounds of dead soldiers and armored Mandalorian warriors stacked in heaps as twin suns rose over a quieted rocky highland hill. In the fore ground plumes of sauntering emerald smoke lifted to the violet sky as an ancient and mighty tree burned upon a solitary peak. The endless star fields of wreckage in space that went on for miles. She saw the floating and icy black bodies of pilots and gunners amongst their ripped apart bombers and torn Starfighters. The C beams off the Tannhauser Star Gate reflected in the chrome of the wrecked Capital Ships giving an ethereal glow to the aftermath of such carnage of hate and blood. A single tear fell from Rey's creamy cheek from the witnessing of the horrific wonder and most terrible beauty unmatched that she saw through her child's own eyes from the sudden connection between them.

"Told you did he?"

Jacen leaned back, away from Rey. He could've slapped her in the face and it would never be half as bad as how she felt when he rejected her open and longing heart.

"Well … I'm not surprised." He sniffed in annoyance. "The old man never got a thing right in his life, why should I think he'd do it any justice this time?" The youth snorted in distain of his old master...

His father, Ben Solo.

"That's not true …!" Rey protested, tears in her glaring eyes. "You're here." She nodded.

Jacen just laughed mirthlessly. "Yeah? Well if you put it to a vote, I'd say the galaxy would disagree with you." He gave a mocking shrug before finishing his drink with a hard grunt in the burn.

"The Galaxy is wrong!" She snarled.

But to her fierce defense of himself from his own heartbreaking cynicism, he only showed distain, slamming his glass on the table. He just glared at the fairy tale beauty that didn't know him at all. "Tell me?" he asked darkly. "How many more monsters is your 'love' gonna make before you'll admit you don't know better than fate?" There was a deep contempt for what she knew he saw as a self-righteous extremist.

Rey's eyes didn't flinch. "Love doesn't make monsters." She almost whispered boring into him with a look of deep compassion and love that was determined.

To her response the youth just shook his head. He leaned in close and never looking away, he spoke.

"If you believe that … Then, no wonder I lost everything."

He motioned his head to Jyn for them to leave. The woman had been watching in puzzlement between two people that had never spoken before, yet, now they were having a conversation that should've been between two people who had known each other their entire lives. But she equated it all to that "Jedi stuff" that sometimes happened between Jacen and mysterious figures. And, why not? It was that "Jedi stuff" that got them here in the first place when Ben Solo found them on Dantoine, looking to save a Princess from "The Necromancer" … some Sith High Priest that Jacen swore to his father that they had killed a long time ago.

Rey looked dejected and heartbroken, her eyes fixed to her son's glass. This wasn't what she had wanted. As Finn would say, it was just more of Rey being Rey. Jaina had loved her all her life, Ben had loved her longer than they could remember, and Rey loved them back just as fiercely. But she didn't know Jacen, and worst of all … he loathed the very idea of her. He was raised by Ben, 3PO, and R2. The Falcon was his home, never belonging anywhere in his father's exile. Not once, not when he fell out with Ben, when he lost his friends, his very reputation as a galactic hero, when he needed his mother most, did Rey come to help him. To her son, Rey was a vile goddess entity worshiped in evil temples, carved into black marble statues, and who young virgin force sensitive girls were sacrificed to. He didn't know Rey the hero, the Jedi Champion, nor the soul mate whose love saved Ben Solo from evil's manipulation and torment. But, then, no one, especially not even herself, had ever been there to tell him. In the end, Ben had been right …

This had been the absolute wrong thing to do.

* * *

**Author's Notes**

_If you're interested in seeing a full story with this premise, let me know … if not, well, this is where it ends._

_Their was a longer scene with Jyn and Jacen's backstory, a fight scene between Jacen and Jyn versus 4-LOM and BossK, and several bar scum bags, just to show off Anakin and Luke's Lightsaber as well as Jacen skill with it and that Jyn is still Badass ... there was also an appearance by Ben and Jaina to rein Jacen in ... and just to have the whole family in one room. But I cut it for expedience, plus ... "First Taste is free"_

_I can't promise that these are the exact characterizations that will show up in a full story. But this is the template for it … separate twins with Ben and Rey raising each of them. Rey the royal governess, their daughter the Disney Princess, Ben the Galactic Vigilante and Jedi Master, and their son Apprentice and Robin to Ben's Batman. I'm not saying I was completely inspired by the first two seasons of "Supernatural" but I am intrigued by a John Winchester esque Ben Solo and there's a fair bit of both Sam and Dean in the characterization of Jacen. _

_Anyway, if you're interested, leave a review/comment. If not, thanks for reading all the same … Being a life-long fan it's kinda scary how easy it is to get sucked into writing in the "Star Wars" universe. _


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